With so many vendors exhibiting at Citrix Synergy this year, how do you know which booths to visit and who to get on your busy schedule? One of the companies on VMblog's list this year is Liquidware. I've been following them for many years, and I've been extremely impressed with their technologies in the VDI and EUC space.

Liquidware is a pioneer in the development of desktop virtualization solutions. They are the only 3rd party desktop solution provider with offerings that are platform-agnostic to support any Windows desktop operating on any desktop platform including physical, virtual or on cloud infrastructures, including Amazon Web Services, Amazon Workspaces, Google and Microsoft Azure. The company's Stratusphere solution delivers visibility into desktop environments and support assessment, design, monitoring and diagnostics (Health Checks) of both the desktop user experience and supporting infrastructure. ProfileUnity delivers a universal user profile that can span versions of Windows OS. And FlexApp delivers advanced Application Layering to allow admins to centrally manage applications, and deliver them to users on demand.

Read this exclusive pre-show interview between VMblog and Liquidware to learn what they have planned for the upcoming Synergy 2018 event.

VMblog: As a Citrix Synergy 2018 sponsor, give us the rundown of your booth setup this year. Who will be there? How can we find you?

Jason Smith: This is our 9th consecutive year as a sponsor at Synergy and we're really hyped about the show this year. As a silver sponsor, you can find us in booth 401, and we'll have some of our senior exec team with us, including David Bieneman, CEO, Jason Mattox, CTO and myself, Jason E. Smith, VP of Products. As always we'll have our product teams there to deliver demos of the latest and greatest features of Liquidware ProfileUnity, FlexApp and Stratusphere. Come visit with us on booth 401.

VMblog: Is there anything interesting or unique about this year's booth setup compared to previous years or events? Do you have a theme for this year's booth?

Smith: We have prime placement in the front and center of the exhibitor floor so we'll be easy to find. Our messaging will be centered around Workspace Environment Management and integration with cloud services such as Amazon S3, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure.

VMblog: What message should an attendee take back with them to their boss after visiting your booth? How can they internally sell your technology?

Smith: Liquidware is a leader and innovator in keeping your desktops dynamic. If your organization wants to unchain their Workspace Management from their desktop solution and be able to move to the latest version of Citrix, Windows 10 or Server 2016, there is no better vendor to look to. Our user environment management, application layering, and monitoring & diagnostics solutions are second to no other vendor.

VMblog: Why should a Synergy attendee add you to their MUST SEE list?

Smith: We'll have exclusive first features we'll be introducing at the show such as our object-based cloud storage for user profiles. We've helped very large organizations through many desktop transitions. Take a look at this video that we recorded on the Citrix Ready booth at HIMMS earlier this year https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbzDZ_QtF_g&t=58s

While it's a healthcare focused message, our value transcends industries. For anyone with responsibility for ensuring their end user experience is a productive and valuable one, Liquidware is a MUST visit booth.

VMblog: How many times have you sponsored before? And what keeps you coming back?

Smith: This is our 9th Citrix Synergy. There's no better singular event in the industry right now for a focused conference on only virtual and RDS desktops. Every attendee is squarely in the market that we design and build our Workspace Environment Management solutions for.

VMblog: What do you like most about sponsoring Citrix Synergy?

Smith: Liquidware solutions provide ‘must have' value on top of the underlying EUC platform, such as Citrix XenApp. Any Citrix customer is a potential customer for Liquidware and therefore we always have fantastic conversations with attendees at Synergy. Seeing delegates faces light up when they ‘get' how we can make their users' lives better is so worthwhile for our booth staff!

VMblog: Can you give VMblog readers a sneak peek as to what you will be showing off at your booth this year?

Smith: Absolutely! We're very excited about our recently announced object-based cloud storage functionality within ProfileUnity that ‘unchains' the enterprise from on-prem and gets organizations ready for cloud services and DaaS. Supported platforms include Amazon S3, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure Blog. This latest version breaks new ground with its object-based cloud storage, to make Liquidware the only company capable of moving a user profile from Microsoft Windows to object-based cloud storage, or multiple clouds, without the use of an SMB. A key benefit is the ability to move user profiles to the cloud in advance of a full Desktop as a Service (DaaS) transition with the promise of a seamless cutover to DaaS when the enterprise is ready to make that move. Other benefits include zero user downtime, built-in disaster recovery, and secure authentication.

We'll also be showing off our automated user data synchronization and redirection to cloud services such as Dropbox Enterprise, Google Drive, and Amazon WorkDocs.

ProfileUnity's zero transition downtime breaks down a significant barrier to DaaS entry for large-scale enterprises. The closest any competing product purports to come to that transition time is two hours per user, which amounts to prohibitively high downtime in large-scale enterprises. By contrast, ProfileUnity offers no lag in productivity and instead immediate increase in productivity.

We will also be previewing a new version of Stratusphere that includes a process optimization feature as well as security and audit reporting, which will include details on Meltdown/Spectre, application patching and process that are running at an admin-elevation within the workspace.

VMblog: Give readers a few reasons why your product or service is considered unique.

Smith: A key differentiation to other solutions in the market is our integration of our UEM solution - ProfileUnity - with our App Layering solution - FlexApp. No other offering on the market today integrates these two key solutions in a single management console. Combine the power of ProfileUnity and FlexApp with our monitoring and user experience solution, Stratusphere, and you have a powerful tool set in your armory to manage your desktop - whether virtual, physical or cloud - lifecycle along with ensuring user satisfaction and productivity.

We'll be demoing all products at booth 401 (front and center in the exhibition hall), so your readers should come along and see for themselves how Liquidware is transforming desktops to next generation workspaces.

VMblog: How does your company and product fit within the Citrix ecosystem?

Our Stratusphere UX solution continues to enable progress in XenApp/XenDesktop production environments, in the onboarding process, diagnosis of issues and putting customers on the road to optimization of all desktops in their environments. And, while Citrix has made acquisitions in both the UEM and App Layering space, Liquidware is still providing significant added value to customers, particularly those with heterogeneous or hybrid environments. As the only remaining independent third-party provider of UEM, App Layering and in the guest user experience monitoring, customers look to us to provide enterprise-class solutions to enhance their Citrix end user deployments.

VMblog: What are you looking forward to most at this year's event?

Smith: The opening first few moments are always my favorite. All of the work for the show will have been done and we can get straight to demoing our latest solutions to attendees.

VMblog: What do you hope to come away with from exhibiting at Synergy? What does event success look like to you?

Smith: Continuing to build our relationship with the Citrix teams we engage with is one reason for attending Synergy. But mainly it's to meet new customers, as well as current ones, to discuss with them the need for best practices in managing their Citrix estates from a users and applications perspective. Success is having great conversations with great people that hopefully results in new customer acquisition.

VMblog: Do you have any tips for first time attendees that you'd like to share?

Smith: We've been attending Citrix Synergy since the days before it was called Synergy! And there are two key elements attendees will benefit from in our opinion. One is the networking, there are so many great community-minded folks with a wealth of experience that are willing to chat and share best practices, so make sure you get to know these people at the many social events during the show. Secondly, do take time to visit the Solutions Expo. Talking to the eco-system vendors surrounding Citrix help to make better informed decisions on infrastructure planning and purchase, plus it's a great place to pick up cool goodies!

VMblog: Are you guys throwing or involved with any type of party during the event? Can you share the details?

Smith: After the success of our inaugural Inside Track event last year at VMworld, we're delighted to be hosting another event at Citrix Synergy on May 8th at noon. EUC influencers and advocates have been invited and we're really looking forward to hosting another insightful event with lively debate!

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For those attending the show, if your organization has already implemented or is planning to implement an EUC environment, you must make sure to add Liquidware to your schedule and visit them at Booth 401. They won't disappoint.

David Marshall has been involved in the technology industry for over 19 years, and he's been working with virtualization software since 1999. He was able to become an industry expert in virtualization by becoming a pioneer in that field - one of the few people in the industry allowed to work with Alpha stage server virtualization software from industry leaders: VMware (ESX Server), Connectix and Microsoft (Virtual Server).

Through the years, he has invented, marketed and helped launch a number of successful virtualization software companies and products. David holds a BS degree in Finance, an Information Technology Certification, and a number of vendor certifications from Microsoft, CompTia and others. He's also co-authored two published books: "VMware ESX Essentials in the Virtual Data Center" and "Advanced Server Virtualization: VMware and Microsoft Platforms in the Virtual Data Center" and acted as technical editor for two popular Virtualization "For Dummies" books. With his remaining spare time, David founded and operates one of the oldest independent virtualization news blogs, VMblog.com. And co-founded CloudCow.com, a publication dedicated to Cloud Computing. Starting in 2009 and continuing all the way to 2016, David has been honored with the vExpert distinction by VMware for his virtualization evangelism.